Another Toneboard

[dogcatcher]

Here is what I have wasted my time on for the last few months.  No more freehand cutting of toneboards for this old man.  It was all done in my own shop.  A toneboard jig for open reed calls with my "own" sound.  And it will howl and a pretty good distress.  I took all of the open reed calls that I have amassed during my hunting career, trust me there were a lot of them.  Then I took all of my favorites and compared the toneboards, took out what I considered the best features of each board.  After compiling all of my notes and irritating every neighbor in the area I drew up a basic shape or slope on my piece of steel.  Then proceeded to take that steel off until I landed up with this.

 
I still need to take it to my machinist and get it hardened but that can wait until after I make a few more boards off of it.  So for now I am real careful with my cutting and filing while making a board..
 
The reasons for this project is that most open reed calls have a routed or Dremel out tone channel.  Being that I never liked doing it that way I wanted a jig that could give me the same benefit without the extra work.  This is as good as it gets.  The flat is higher than center so the curve starts higher leaving a deeper channel at the end of the tone channel. 
 
Last but not least.  NO, I will not be making these for sale or making custom jigs period, and I repeat NO.
 
Marvin
 

[HaMeR]

Prudy cool Marvin!! If you think you're neighbors were annoyed with the making of the jig just wait til they hear what it produces.  ;D ;D

[dogcatcher]

The jig making doesn't bother them it was the testing of all of the little adjustments to the toneboards as I went along.  When I am doing the metal work it is pretty quiet, but the testing  of the end results will get all of the neighborhood dogs going.

Marvin

[Al_at_THO Game Calls]

Did you use a mill to cut your jig or did you just do it by hand ( I can't imagine that)

Al @ THO

[BigB]

I like it and think it looks good.  I wish my jig was similar to yours, where it has a bit more length on it towards the exhaust end of the jig.

What kind of steel did you use for the jig?  How much do you think it will cost to get it heat treated?

[HaMeR]

 ;D

[Troy of Run -N- Gun Game Calls]

Very nice Marvin.

[dogcatcher]

It was done partly with a mill, refined with a  file and sweet talked with a little profanity.  As far as the type of steel I am not sure, the machinist said it could be case hardened when I get to that point. 

As I got closer to the final slope I would cut a test board, to kind of train myself not to be rough on the jig I would mark the cutting edges with a magic marker.  After a few of the test boards I could do the cutting without scraping the marker, with practice I would estimate that this jig could last quite a few years without hardening.  I am cutting the boards a little big so that I can sand and polish a real smooth top to the board.

BigB, I made the back end short so that I could use it to make my one piece open reeds with a bell and not have a long straight 5/8" rod as part of it,.  I am thinking about cutting off another about 3/8" off of the end, but need to make an open reed one piece first to see what it will look like with out the cutting.

I started today on a Louisiana style duck call jig.  I will post a picture whenever I get it done.  This is a lot more complicated than the simple slope of this one.  It will also take quite a bit more file work and sweet talking to get it finished.

Marvin

[VECtor Calls]

 ;D  Very impressive work there Marvin!  I love the idea!

Parker